


the first half

by jjjat3am



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-18
Updated: 2016-02-18
Packaged: 2018-05-21 12:59:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 4,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6052483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jjjat3am/pseuds/jjjat3am
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A collection of various tumblr fic, too short to be posted on its own.</p><p>Ch.1: Sam/Steve - Sam earns Bucky's trust<br/>Ch.2: Sam/Steve - ace!Steve<br/>Ch.3: Sam/Steve/Bucky - Sam gets sick<br/>Ch.4: Sam/Steve - Halloween<br/>Ch.5: Sam/Bucky - First meetings<br/>Ch.6: Sam/Bucky - Attraction <br/>Ch.7: Sam/Steve - Vacation <br/>Ch.8: Sam/Riley - Jokes <br/>Ch.9: Sam/Steve - The Quiet <br/>Ch.10: Sam/Steve - Mabel the kitten</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote all these about a year ago when I was still writing extensively in the Marvel fandom and I just recently got convinced to move them to ao3.
> 
> I hope you enjoy them!

Sam Wilson is great. He’s handsome and smart and kind, knows how to cook. He can sing really well, has a mean right hook, and he knows the exact moment to take Steve’s hand and make it mean something.

 

Bucky hates him.

 

In his torn up, dragged down feelings, all he wants to do is curl up in Steve’s friendship, the one thing that hasn’t changed when everything else has. But he can’t.

 

It’s not him and Steve against the world anymore, because there’s Natasha there and Nick Fury, and Sam Fucking Wilson and the way he makes Steve smile in the morning.

 

Objectively, he knows he’s being childish, he just can’t help it. Too many things have changed and even the one thing that wasn’t supposed to change still somehow did.

 

So he hurls some pretty shitty barbs Sam’s way, glares at him when Steve’s not looking and wedges himself between them on the couch. He knows that Steve is disappointed in him, knows that his attitude is making him sad and confused, but he’s unwilling to give in, fueled by fear and his own stubbornness. 

 

To be fair to him, Sam doesn’t give an inch. He returns Bucky’s insults with his own and glares back until the air between them is practically crackling with tension. He’s completely willing to wrestle for the last cookie and plays dirty. 

 

Bucky likes it, despite himself. Sam is one of the rare people that don’t treat him like glass for what happened to him, who doesn’t act like his trauma excuses his actions. Bucky respects that.

 

Eventually, their words soften from vicious to almost…playful. They still wrestle over the last cup of coffee. Bucky still finds copious amount of bird shit on things he leaves outside. Sam finds snow in his bed. It’s not great, but maybe it’s not so serious.

 

However, it’s not until Sam takes a bullet for Steve that Bucky finally admits defeat. 

 

It’s not as much a bullet, per say, as it’s a giant alien robot that Sam diverts mid-flight on its murderous path. The resulting impact takes him through a building and into freefall that gets thankfully interrupted by the Hulk. It still messes him up pretty badly.

 

Steve is beside himself with worry and he refuses to leave Sam’s bedside for even a minute. Eventually, even his body gives into sleep and he slumps against the hospital bed, Sam’s hand still clasped in his. Bucky stays up to watch over them both. His insomnia might as well be good for something.

 

This means he’s there to witness Sam’s eyelids twitch and then flutter open. He’s there to see the relief and joy and pure love when his tired eyes lay upon Steve’s sleeping form. And Bucky’s stubborn, but he knows when he’s beaten.

 

“If you hurt him, they won’t find your body,” he says, casually, causing Sam’s eyes to snap up and widen. “The Red Room has some lovely torture methods and you’ll get a crash course in all of them.”

 

“I won’t…I won’t hurt him,” Sam manages to croak through his dry lips.

 

“Good,” Bucky says, settling in his corner a bit more comfortably. “Go back to sleep, Wilson. I’ve got your back.”

 

 


	2. Sam/Steve - ace!Steve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this when I was still figuring out if the label applied to me and as such, it means a hella lot to me

 

It was hard, listening to Bucky talk about whatever girl he’s been with, about the tickle of her hair and the softness of her neck and the round swell of the bottom, and feel…nothing. Interest, but in the far-off way he has when he finds something beautiful to draw. Not a stirring in his loins or a predatory excitement or anything else described in the romance novels he sometimes borrowed from Mrs. Eddie in apartment n.8. Mrs Eddie was a curious lady, a daytime docks prostitute with romantic dreams and a wealth of books and music that she’d share with Steve willingly.

 

(Bucky told him later that she’d have been willing to share a few more things with Steve. The only thing he’d noticed was that she smelled of peonies.)

 

There was talk of sex in the training camp. In fact there was little talk of anything else. Steve couldn’t get a meal without overhearing someone describing a beautiful pair of breasts, and the nights were full of muted moans and the sound of flesh on flesh of a hundred soldiers remembering home in the circle of their fingers. 

 

And still, Steve felt nothing. It would have been easier, maybe, if he had, if he could take himself in hand and think about Bucky’s eyelashes or the sweet curls of his last date or Mrs Eddie’s softly sagging breasts. But he could only miss them, his body a thrum of tension and fear. 

 

Then, there was Agent Peggy Carter and she was the most beautiful person he’d ever seen. Every part of his being ached to draw her, the defiant bow of her mouth, the powerful shape of her legs and her vibrant eyes. If he could draw Peggy for the rest of his life then it would be a life worth living. 

 

She smiled at him and he felt warm, his stomach filled with a thousand butterflies.

 

And yet, when she tossed her curls from her face, he wanted only their tickle against his nose and when she put on her pretty red dress he didn’t think about unbuttoning it. He thought about their bodies asleep next to each other, their legs and limbs entwined like the stitches on her blouse and fell asleep with a smile on his face.

 

But that’s as far as he came. No…need, no urge, none of the red-hot desire he saw in almost everyone else when they looked at her. And that, above all else, convinced him something in him was broken.

 

Because if he couldn’t desire Peggy Carter, what else was there?

 

Maybe it was the asthma drugs. Or the pneumonia he had as a child. Maybe he was born wrong, his sex drive stunted like the rest of his wretched, useless body.

 

Dr. Erskine said he’d fix him and he had, gave him a new body and a whole new set of shoulders to bear the weight of the world that settled on them when he saw the blood on the doctor’s shirt.

 

(but he didn’t fix this. it was ironic how he became a sex object for millions without feeling sexual desire himself. he wanted to tell Erskine his serum failed, thought he’d appreciate the data. but he was dead. and then Bucky was dead and everyone was dead.

 

the plane sunk into the ice and Steve was spared from worrying about sex for a few decades)

 

When he wakes up, sex is everywhere. On the billboards, in the ads, in the frozen section of his supermarket. Luckily there was monsters too and those were pretty distracting for everyone involved.

 

After the monsters, there’s too much time to think. About what he’d lost and what he’d supposedly gained, and what he never had in the first place. Dames flirt with him openly, and he thinks they’re beautiful, men flirt with him openly and he thinks they’re beautiful too. But he can’t give them what they most obviously want.

 

(Kisses are nice. Soft and wet and warm, but when it comes to more then kisses, he makes his excuses and leaves.)

 

He walks through the new century wearing a mantle around his neck, hoping it’ll disguise him enough that he’ll never have to bare himself to anyone.

 

Natasha sets him on dates. He appreciates it, because it’s her way of showing worry, but none of the persons he meets can see beyond the shield.

 

Then, he meets Sam. And Sam is beautiful too, and strong and kind and funny. He makes Steve feel at peace for what seems (and is) forever. Sam makes him feel secure. 

 

He knows Sam desires him, is slowly falling in love with Steve, just like Steve is falling in love back. But Steve can’t…he just can’t.

 

And one day it just comes spilling out.

 

They’re having this conversation about what Sam learned about the Howling Commandos in school, about how Sam did a 7th grade report on Gabe Jones and how proud he was to get an A+ on it. Then Sam looks at him from under his eyelashes, like he does sometimes, and it makes Steve want to draw stars in the shadows under his eyes.

 

“You know, I used to have this Captain America poster when I was in high school. And I used too…ugh this is embarrassing, don’t laugh…I used to…” Steve almost doesn’t hear the rest of what he says over the rush of blood in his ears.

 

“I’ve never,” he says abruptly.

 

“You’ve what never?”

 

“I’ve never had sex. I never wanted to.” Steve struggles with words, always has, but he and Sam have a rule about talking about the things that bother them, because Sam can’t read his mind, no matter how well he seems to get him sometimes.

 

So Steve talks and Sam listens, and the only time he interrupts him is when Steve calls himself _broken_.

 

“You _aren’t_! Steve, you aren’t broken, nothing is wrong with you, I promise.” But as Steve spills his tears down Sam’s collar, he’s got a hard time believing him.

 

The next day, he wakes up to a kitchen table full of articles and books. He mouths the foreign words on the page and they burn like chilli on his tongue.

 

_A-sex-ual_

 

_asexual_

 

_ASEXUAL_

 

He reads the whole stack and then goes online to find more.

 

He  writes the word on the steamy mirror in the bathroom, watches his distorted face in the reflection. He whispers it to himself when he wakes up, tries to find it in the grounds at the bottom of his first cup of coffee. He finds it in the soft petals of a flowers on his walk. He says it into the crook of Sam’s neck, where it always smells like clean air and the barest hint of ozone.

 

Asexual.

 

And the more Steve thinks about it, the more he says it over and over again, the more it becomes okay. The less it becomes a part of a broken old machine and more of something he can wrap himself in and call home.

 

Just like Sam.

 

 


	3. Sam/Steve/Bucky - Sam gets sick

 

Sam has the strongest immune system out of everyone he knows (except for super-serumed soldiers, but they don’t count), but when he gets sick he gets pretty darn sick.

 

It starts with a morning headache that escalates into a pounding in his temples by nightfall. He goes to bed halfway through Lego movie, every loud sound sending another spike through his temples. He doesn’t stir when Bucky and Steve settle on either side of him in bed a few hours later, and the two of them exchange a worried glance over his prone body.

 

When Sam wakes up in the morning his whole body hurts and he’s absolutely freezing. The bed is empty on either side, which is unusual, because Sam is always the first one up, ready to make breakfast and go for a run. The thought of any of these things right now, makes him burrow deeper into his blankets with a helpless sigh.

 

He can hear the banging of pots and pans in the kitchen, and he opens his mouth to call for someone, but all he gets out is a ineffective croak. Thankfully, Bucky appears in the doorway a few minutes later and Sam is interrupted in the process of trying to reach his phone on the nightstand (he doesn’t quite know what his plan is: call into work for a sick day? call the landline in the kitchen? call Fury for his family’s cold medicine? everything is muddled).

 

“Hey,” Bucky says softly and the sunlight from the window hits his metal arm and reflects the infernal light right into Sam’s eyes. He lets out a painful groan as the headache from the night before returns full force. Bucky is by his side in an instant, pressing his palm against Sam’s feverish cheek. “You don’t look so good, buddy.”

 

“M'sick,” says Sam, closing his eyes and leaning his head against Bucky’s warm hand. He’s still cold and he wonders what it would take to convince Bucky to stay in bed with him for a while longer, curled around him in a Bucky shaped blanket.

 

“I can see that. I’ll go tell Steve, okay? He’ll call you in sick.” Sam flails helplessly after Bucky’s retreating figure, letting out a pitiful sound that has Bucky adding: “I’ll be back soon, okay? Hold tight.”

 

Sam shakes under the blanket, curling up to hopefully contain some warmth. His head is pounding and his throat feels scrapped raw. He feels suspiciously like he might start crying any second now, so he closes his eyes instead and tries to sleep. 

 

He wakes up to Steve’s voice calling his name. He’s dimly aware of big palms helping him sit up, before a cup of tea is pushed into his hands, radiating blessed warmth. Steve must be really worried about him, if he’s brought him tea instead of coffee. That’s practically blasphemy in Steve’s book (Sam dimly wonders what Peggy Carter would have thought about that, but can’t focus on the thought for long enough).

 

“Bucky told me you were sick,” Steve says, brushing careful fingers through Sam’s hair. “I called into the center, they’ll have Carol take over your sessions for the rest of the week.”

 

Sam nods absently, then grimaces when it makes his head rattle.

 

“I’m cold,” he says, almost petulantly. “Cuddle me?”

 

Steve chuckles softly, but climbs onto the bed and then Sam is finally, blessedly, warm.

 

He has to sit up again when Bucky comes in with a plate of scrambled eggs and two white pills. He takes two bites of the first and takes the second with minimal fuss. It doesn’t take much begging to coax Bucky into bed with both of them and then finally Sam can go to sleep, comforted by the whispered conversation going on above him.

 

(Natasha drops by in the afternoon, carrying Fury’s family cold medicine. It’s unspeakably disgusting, but that, and the two portable heaters he calls lovers, do wonders for his speedy recovery.)


	4. Sam/Steve -Halloween

It’s not like Steve is avoiding the rest of the Avengers, not really. He spends time with Natasha, and Clint, when he and Sam happen to be in roughly the same vicinity. But Stark gave him a high-tech telephone and never called, and he and Dr. Banner hadn’t exchanged more than a handshake and a kind smile, and Thor is gone, back to his home world where gods are the norm rather than exceptions.

(he gets emails from Pepper every two months though, containing various combinations of military abbreviations all amounting to the same thing: _Everything is under control_ )

He and Sam are too busy for mostly anything else, really, running a wild goose chase around the country, following a flash of metal in a store front window and ransacked HYDRA hideouts, always just a breath too late, always just a step behind.

So it’s a coincidence that they end up in California right about the end of October, chasing a trail long since gone cold. The handwritten invitation finds them at a motel they’ve been camping at for three days now, pitch black envelope and no return address.

“Is it a bomb?” Sam asks, when he comes in with their lunches and finds Steve fiddling with the envelope.

“No. It’s probably Stark.” Steve sighs, pulling the bags closer when Sam dumps them on the bed.

“So, it might be,” Sam grins. “Go on then. Open it.”

Steve cuts it open with one of Sam’s daggers and reads it out loud between bites of his sandwich.

“ _Superheroes of the world,”_ it reads, “ _you’ve been summoned to converge upon Stark castle this fine Halloween, the festivities set to start at 8 p.m. Costumes mandatory, and I don’t mean work clothes. Come join us, it’ll be spooky!”_ It’s signed with “ _Lord Stark of Ironfell_ ”.

Underneath, in small, even letters, there’s Pepper’s note. _“Please come. It’ll make him much easier to deal with. There won’t be many people there.”_

And Steve can imagine several places he would rather be on the 31st of October than in Tony Stark’s Malibu mansion, dressed in fancy dress, but Sam makes an offhand comment about loving Halloween and _“would Clint choke on his drink if Sam went as a sexy angel?”_ , and Steve finds himself picking out props at a local costume store.

Halloween comes quickly and Steve finds himself in front of the mirror, contemplating his reflection. He’s drawn scarring on his face in black pencil, carefully tracing the random patterns on his skin, and he hopes that Bruce won’t be offended by the barely there tint of green on his face.

“Steve?” Sam calls out from the other side of the door, “Are you ready?”

 

Steve nods to himself in the mirror, then exits the bathroom. Sam’s smile, emphasized with sparkling glitter, loses some of its shine. He takes the few steps forward to press one of the bolts on Steve’s neck firmer into the skin.

 

“Frankenstein, huh?” he asks.

 

“Frankenstein’s monster, actually. People always get those two confused.” Steve says, leaning a little into the touch.

 

Sam doesn’t say anything further, just squeezes Steve’s shoulder once, before breaking away to gather his stuff.

 

Steve knows that Sam is silent because he understands, had probably grown up with seeing pictures of Steve before his miraculous transformation; pale, skinny and asthmatic. _The Walking Dead_ , he’d heard a doctor say to a nurse once, while in the throes of yet another fever. Those days are long gone now; he barely even gets a cold these days, much less an asthma attack.

 

And yet sometimes he wakes up at some freakish hour of the morning and stumbles into the bathroom only to do a double take at his reflection, because he remembers being Steve Rogers, several feet smaller and several pounds lighter. 

 

Sometimes, he traces the skin of his face, the planes of his body with an artist’s eye, catalogs proportion and color and the shift of muscles under unmarked skin. Sometimes, he closes his eyes and sees the pride on Dr. Erskine’s face, the wonder on Stark’s, and tries to see himself as more than a picture in an art textbook.

 

Because, maybe everything good in him didn’t come from a bottle, but a lot did. And maybe sometimes he wonders how many things he can still afford to call his own.

 

A feather from one of Sam’s wings brushes against his neck while they’re pressed close together in the elevator. It’s soft and it tickles, and Sam smells like glitter and pumpkin spice cookies. Steve smiles.

 

 


	5. Sam/Bucky - First meetings

The first time Sam meets the Winter Soldier, he doesn’t really have a lot of time for reflections. There’s a man ripping the steering wheel right out of his hands, a good analogy to how out of control his life had gotten since he started jogging around the Washington monument. All he gets is the glimpse of a mask through the rain of glass and then the car is flipping and he’s scrambling frantically for his wing pack, praying that Steve and Natasha are okay.

 

The first time Bucky meets the Falcon, he feels his claws sink into his back and the blinding pain off it knocks him over. It keeps him off his designated target and he doesn’t like that. More importantly, the Handlers don’t like that. He aims for the wings, as steel as his arm, but somehow not nearly as alien. The Falcon falls, wings twisted up behind him like a painting he remembers someone showing him once(His Handler? His…mother?). If he were a different man, he’d wonder why the man hasn’t called himself Angel, but he’s no man and he has orders to fulfill.

 

The first time Sam Wilson meets Bucky Barnes is in a warehouse in West Virginia. He and Steve had split up to search the rooms, and he spots a figure crouched on the floor in one of the offices. There’s a small amount of sunlight coming through the barred up window and it sends tiny lights scattering across the room where it reflects off the metal arm. The man looks up and his eyes are the grey of the sky in a storm. Not optimal flying conditions, but Sam could deal. He calls out Bucky’s name softly and walks over to crouch in front of him, offering his hand in greeting.

 

The first time Bucky Barnes meets Sam Wilson, he’s standing in the doorway, surrounded by light. He calls him by his name and Bucky knows he’s the one being called. A hand reaches out to curl around his fingers and it’s been so long since he’s been touched with the intent to comfort that it’s disarming. He lets Sam haul him to his feet and helps him walk out of the room.

 

The first time Steve sees Sam and Bucky together, they’re still holding hands.

 


	6. Sam/Bucky -  Attraction

 

In the days after the brainwashing starts wearing off, everything is hard. Remembering is hard and when the memories come easy they’re hard to relive. Hunger is hard. Cold is hard. Running is hard. 

 

Things get easier after he gets found, because at least he’s warm and fed and he has a home, however tentative it he is at calling it that. His memories are slowly returning and sometimes there are good things sprinkled among the bad like he grains of sugar on his mother’s apple pie.

 

Still, looking at Steve is hard, because it’s like Bucky’s memories overlap with reality, and he sees a skinny face over a well rounded one and the underlying scream of _**Target** _ underneath it all.

 

Watching Natalia is hard, because she’s vibrant and cold and she reminds him of the Siberian winters he once called home. He knows he’s not the man she remembers and is grateful for it.

 

He’s not the man either of them remember, and he’s not sure how he feels about that.

 

The only thing that isn’t hard in his life as it stands right now, is Sam Wilson.

 

He has not sharp memories of Sam Wilson, save for the imprint of broken glass and the twist of an angel’s wings. Those he can and will endure.

 

Sam is easy smiles and easier demanour. He makes pancakes like his momma used to make them and he does the crossword puzzle every morning like his dad used to, and he sings while he does housework, which is entirely new.

 

Sam has a sense of humour that Bucky remembers once understanding. He laughs one day when Sam tells a lame bird joke. It’s not his first, but it’s close.

 

Touching Sam is easy because he’s allowed to be gentle and he doesn’t flinch away from his metal fingers because he remembers warmer in their place. He lets Bucky rest his head on his biceps and close his eyes until the world reorders itself behind his eyelids. The warmth of his skin keeps him from spiraling into something he couldn’t get out off.

 

Talking to Sam is easy, because Sam is good at listening. Listening to Sam talk is even easier, because his voice is steady and comforting and he moves his hands a lot when he talks. He talks a lot about someone named Riley and Bucky feels honored to carry someone else’s memories for a little while.

 

Kissing Sam is easy, because it’s better than any other kisses he’s ever had. Touching Sam is easy, because it’s never underlined with expectation-

 

Things are hard, but year by year, month by month, day by day, they get easier. All the while, his love for Sam remains the same. 

 

Easy and simple and sincere.


	7. Sam/Steve - Vacation

They’re not used to taking time off.

 

Still, everyone insists that their 10th anniversary deserves a proper celebration and taking a vacation seems like the most normal out of all of the suggestions from their friends.

 

They agonize over the travel agency brochures, trying to choose between seemingly identical hotels, where every beach is “fantastically beautiful” and every event night is “exotic and eventful”. They finally just pick a page at random.

 

Natasha comes to pick them up for their cruise to Hawaii, takes one look at their lone duffel bag before rolling her eyes and herding them back inside to repack their entire wardrobe.

 

(including a hair-straightener neither of them knew they had and a box labeled ‘Erotic Treasure Box’, which comes with a note signed ‘Have fun, Bucky’)

 

They’re not used to taking time off.

 

Which is why during their 3 week stay in Hawaii, they manage to bust a drug cartel, prevent the assassination of a foreign ambassador and punch out a shark.

 

(also, Sam is surprisingly bad at kiteboarding, Steve hates margaritas and the ‘Erotic Treasure Box’ is more fun that the name would imply)


	8. Sam/Riley - Jokes

 

Riley is always smiling in Sam’s memories. He’d always tell Sam how the world didn’t laugh enough, so it was like he was doing his duty to fill it with as much smiles as possible.

 

It explained all of his elaborate schemes for pranks he’d come up with and that Sam always somehow found himself involved in.

 

There was the time they put itching powder in a sergeant’s underwear and almost got caught because they couldn’t stop giggling during training.

 

Or the time they set the barrack-wide intercom system to play Oops I did it again instead of the usual wake-up call. They whole squad did extra drills for a month because Riley kept starting sing-alongs at runs. The squad sergeant took one look at a squad of pararescuemen screaming ‘Oh, Baby, BABY!’ at the top of their lungs and almost burst a blood vessel.

 

The most memorable one was when they dressed Riley in drag to leap out of a cake for their squadmate’s birthday. Sam was the one who had to order the [American Flag Bikini](http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=http%3A%2F%2F47bf27f91a0b1190a802-5e12d9db40f00b709a94922ff2488490.r40.cf2.rackcdn.com%2Fproduct-hugerect-291477-32661-1393204609-25d4a343c682ec46e8736ac6ee51e70e.jpg&t=M2RlNmYwNjlmNjU0ZDAyOGQzYjRiYjEwOGYzZTQzNzdiNzg3YzRhZSxjOWVoR3ZEQw%3D%3D) off the web, praying that no one was checking his bills.

 

(He’d pressed Riley up against the cupboard door after the commotion died down and covered his smiling lips with his own.

 

To this day, he sometimes wakes up sweaty and panting from the memory of a sure touch and phantom laughter.)

 

Riley is always smiling in Sam’s memories. After he died, Sam laughed just a little bit less.

 

 


	9. Sam/Steve - The Quiet

“Huh.”

 

“What?” Steve murmured, drowsy from the warmth and the amazing sex. He barely registered the tip of Sam’s finger drawing a line across his back.

 

“You have a lot of freckles.” Sam’s touch grew firmer, almost as if he were playing connect-the-dots. “They’re almost like constellations. Like this one,” a swipe of his finger “looks just like Big Dipper.”

 

“Oh, I didn’t know I was dealing with such a knowledgeable astronomer.”

 

“Literately everyone knows about the Big Dipper, you berk.”

 

Steve fell asleep to Sam’s grumbling and the gentle touch of his hand.

 

The next morning he went to shower and let out a surprised noise at the state of his back. Apparently Sam had found a sharpie somewhere in the middle of the night and connected all of Steve’s freckles into actual constellations, each carefully labeled.

 

Some were familiar, like Orion or Leo, and some were made up, like Steve Jumping Without A Parachute right above his hip and a pair of wings on his lower back (Sam’s).

 

It was almost a shame to wash them off and even more of a shame to cover them up. So Steve didn’t bother to put on any clothes as he headed out the bathroom to thank Sam for his drawing. It was only fair. 

 


	10. Sam/Steve - Mabel the kitten

“What are you doing?”

 

 

Steve freezes in the middle of the living room, foot stuck in mid-air like in a slapstick comedy. He’s soaked through from the rain outside and dripping all over the new carpet Natasha bought them.

 

“Hi, Sam! Um, nothing, I mean, I’m just going to my room to change, you know.”

 

Steve’s hoodie meows.

 

“Steve.” Sam says slowly. “Did your hoodie just meow?”

 

“No! It’s just my stomach, you know that serum metabolism!” His laugh is forcefully loud to cover up another _meow_ from the hoodie.

 

“Show me the cat, Steve.”

 

“What cat? No cats here, just you and me and maybe Clint up in the air-ducts again, haha, isn’t he a joker?”

 

“Steve.” _meow_

 

Steve sighs, unzipping his hoodie to reveal the tiniest kitten Sam has ever seen.

 

“Her name is Mabel.” says Steve, glaring stubbornly at the wall next to Sam’s head.

 

Sam runs his hand through his hair and sighs. Mabel meows.

 

“Fine. Give her here and go find some dry clothes. I’m going to warm up some milk.”

 

 


End file.
